Lemony Vegan Eggnog Cheesecake Recipe

This is my second eggnog recipe in one week. I don't know if that's enough to count as a streak, but here it goes. Earlier today, I was browsing the boards at Peta2 and I stumbled across this post which had a link for vegan eggnog cheesecake at the bottom of it. 

Now before I went vegan, I was an absolute sucker for cheesecake. I started making them for any celebration or excuse I could find, and people started ordering them from me and I was making some pretty good cash. I stopped making them as much when I found out I am lactose intolerant. Then when I went vegan, I stopped making them altogether. That was one thing that I did kind of miss, though I got used to no cheesecake pretty fast. It didn't occur to me until recently that I could make vegan cheesecakes with vegan cream cheese! However, I haven't really had the time, so this vegan cheesecake is the first one I have ever made! I'm pretty excited about it. SO excited, in fact, that I forgot to take any pictures as I was going.

So, the recipe at Fat Free Vegan Kitchen called for a pre-made graham cracker pie crust or an oatmeal pie crust that she has a separate recipe for. I'm not a big fan of oatmeal stuffs, and my past cheesecake-making days told me I could do way better than a pre-made graham cracker crust. Now, my sisters are girl scouts, and they always get more cookies then they can sell, so we have plenty sitting around the house, and since the recipe also calls for lemon juice, I figured I could make a crust with Lemonades Girl Scout Cookies, which are vegan. (And delicious.) 

Crust Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 - 2 boxes of Lemonades Girl Scout Cookies (Thanks-a-Lot Girl Scout Cookies work too if you want chocolate instead of lemon, or you could use any other 8.5 oz package of crunchy vegan cookies, preferably a relatively plain cookie, or it will distract from the flavor of the cheesecake.)
• 6-7 tablespoons of vegan butter (Earth Balance brand works well.)

To Make The Crust:

• Empty a box and a half of the cookies into a gallon zip-lock bag and zip the bag shut. If you prefer thicker or higher crust use the entire second box. 
• Use a rolling pin, tenderizer, large baking spoon or whatever large hard-to-break kitchen utensil you can find, and take out all of your days frustrations on those cookies! Beat the cookies with your utensil of choice, until the crumbs are finely crushed. 
• Empty the bag of cookies into a medium bowl, and set them aside. 
• Put vegan butter into a microwaveable container, and heat for 30 seconds. Most of the butter should have melted, but should there still be any unmelted, stir for a few seconds until all the butter has turned to liquid.
• Pour the butter into the bowl of cookie crumbs and stir until all the crumbs are evenly coated with the butter-stuff. (If you want, you can use your clean hands to mix the butter and crumbs.) It will begin to clump. That's okay. 
• Scrape the mixture into a meduim (9") springform pan. With clean hands, (or formerly clean hands now slightly coated in vegan butter and cookie crumbs,) press the crumb mixture evenly on the bottom and along the sides of the springform pan. Make sure there aren't any holes in the bottom of your crust. 
• When finished, set the pan aside.

I followed the original recipe for the most part, except for a few ingredients and some of the preparation. I didn't want to use brandy or rum because that's unnecessary calories, and I can't buy any for myself anyway since I'm under-aged. So I was going to use imitation rum flavoring that we already had in the pantry, except when I checked it, I didn't have enough. So I used extra vanilla and I think it turned out just fine. I also simplified a lot of the preparation, so there are fewer steps, and it works better for a blender than the original instructions.

Filling Ingredients:

• 1 12.3-ounce package extra firm silken tofu (Use a light version for fewer calories.) 
• 1 8-ounce package vegan cream cheese (Tofutti Better than Cream Cheese works well.) 
• 3/4 cup vegan sugar 
• 1/2 cup vegan eggnog (Silk Seasonal Nog, which I used in my Vegan Nog Waffles, works great.) 
• 3 tablespoons lemon juice 
• 3 tablespoons vanilla 
• 1/2 rounded teaspoon ground nutmeg 
• 1/2 rounded teaspoon cinnamon 
• 3 tablespoons cornstarch 

To Make the Filling:

• Preheat Oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. 
• Drain tofu. 
• Crumble tofu into blender or food processor (I used a blender.) Add the package of vegan cream cheese, vegan eggnog, lemon juice, and vanilla. Blend or process until you have reached a uniform, creamy consistency. 
• Add sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, and cornstarch, and blend until sugar and cornstarch have dissolved, and cinnamon and nutmeg are evenly suspended. 

Final Preparation:

• Pour filling into crust. Filling may fill the pan above the top of the crust, which is perfectly fine. 
• Place springform pan on a cookie sheet (To prevent dripping melty vegan butter from making a mess all over your oven,) place it in the oven, and shut the door. 
• Bake for 50 minutes, though I'd recommend checking the cheesecake at 45 minutes just in case it is already starting to brown. The center should still be slightly jiggly. 
• Remove the pans from the oven with oven mitts or potholders etc., and place the pans on a cooling rack. 
• Leaving the cookie sheet on the cooling rack, place the springform pan with cheesecake in the refrigerator to chill. Allow to cool for at least an hour before serving. 
• To serve, remove outer edge of springform pan, and if you are brave, slide the cheesecake onto a serving dish. If you would rather avoid potentially making a huge mess all over your kitchen, throwing away your cheesecake, and having to bake a second one, just place the whole bottom of the springform pan on a serving dish, or just eat the cheesecake now off of the pan without getting an extra plate dirty. 
• Enjoy! 

So, if you try out this recipe, let me know what you thought of it! I would really love to have some feedback, and I would be happy to try out any variations that you all come up with. Have fun baking!